Valparaiso, Chile, is an UNESCO city and the second-largest in Chile. At the time of Charles Darwin, it was the greatest port in the Pacific.

Written by

Stephen Schell
For the Coloradoan

The name Darwin easily evokes a word association game moving from evolution to Galapagos Islands to turtles to apes to the Scopes Trial to Creationism and even Intelligent Design.

One word that typically is not associated with Charles Darwin is adventurer. In preparing for a recent trip to Central Chile with my wife, I began to read "The Voyage of the Beagle.'' My goal was to follow Darwin on his journey out of England on December 27, 1831, around South America and "meet up with him'' when he first arrived in Santiago in 1834. I came to discover Darwin spent 60 percent of his five-year journey ...